


Paroxysm

by flamestrider



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Dysfunctional Family, F/M, Love/Hate, M/M, Organized Crime, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-09
Updated: 2015-11-14
Packaged: 2018-04-30 18:56:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5175986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flamestrider/pseuds/flamestrider
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Ghilain Clan has been the most prominent organized family in the Midwest since the turn of the century, but their dwindling bloodline has caused instability in the region.  Their hold on the territory is threatened by the arrival of the Chalons family from New Orleans, intent on expanding their reach northward. Two well-meaning and extremely polite police officers find themselves caught somewhere in the middle as they investigate an influx of crime in their small, sleepy town.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chiasm

**Author's Note:**

> A lot of inspiration for this particular AU has been drawn from black comedy crime dramas, especially Fargo and Pulp Fiction. Fina is my original character, as are the other members of the Ghilain crime family.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Ghilain Clan bickers among themselves after the youngest fails a simple task as Officers Rutherford and Theirin take a morning coffee break.

**_FARGO, NORTH DAKOTA, JANUARY 3 rd, 1981._ **

 

* * *

 

 

The two dark-skinned figures had loitered outside of the cannery for twenty seven minutes, enough time for half a pack of cigarettes to be smoked and crushed into the grey snow on the sidewalk. To any passers-by they appeared to be long-suffering employees enjoying their union-mandated smoke break, huddled together to murmur their grievances in private. One figure was two heads taller than the other, allowing his eyes to dart toward the factory door every so often, the crease in his brow deepening as the minutes ticked on.

When the door to the old brick building opened, the two inclined their heads to the third that joined them. It was in near-perfect harmony that the three of them reached into the pockets of their overcoats and produced identical Marlboro Lights; the sound of three lighters sparking cracked through the still morning air before three pairs of boots tread across the empty parking lot.

“They ain’t gonna budge,” came the gruff murmur from the tallest man. He was bowed against the wind as it tore through the empty space, intent on keeping his cigarette lit. “Told ya they wouldn’t,” he added. He spat against the ground before he lifted his head, mouth pulled into a furious scowl. He grumbled a slew of curses beneath his breath as he slipped on a patch of ice, arms flailing through the air as he caught his balance.

The other two did not falter once in their step, nor did they spare him so much as a glance—the only indication that either had noted his misstep was a single derisive snort that cut through the silence.

“Hey, I’m fuckin’ _talkin’_ here, and—“

“And… what? You want us to give you a pat on the head every time you string a few words together?”

A lit cigarette bounced benignly off of his coat, flicked by the shortest of the pair, and his ire was inflamed. He took a short, quick step toward the woman who had spoken. She did not flinch at his approach—he used to be able to set her on edge with the mere suggestion of coming near her, though her brother hardly frightened her now. Her lip curled into a sneer as they maintained their positions, arms laid across her chest.

“So, what, you ain’t gonna try to talk to ‘em?”

“You said they weren’t going to budge,” replied the second brother through a mouthful of smoke. He flicked the butt of his cigarette before he blew against his hands, eager to get feeling back into his numb fingers.

“I said that they… well, _yeah_ —“

“I get it,” drawled Mort. “You can’t convince a few guys to hand over the cash, which, mind you, they _agreed_ to.”

“They say that there ain’t nothing in writin’.”

“I was a _gentleman’s_ agreement,” Mort replied stiffly, craning his neck to squint against the sun. “Point is, ‘twee little Tes comes crying to his older brother and sister when he gets turned away at the inn. How d’you expect to help when you can’t even extort a few hundred bucks right?”

The woman gave a little sigh before she dug around in the pocket of her suede coat. Mort and Tes continued to bicker as she unlocked the passenger side door with the keys she had found. She was happy to drown out their raised voices as she turned the ignition before she shoved her hands back into the safe, warm confines of her coat.

She had been fine with allowing the two five minutes growl and snarl at one another, though her irritation mounted as the minutes swam by and it seemed that they were no closer to any resolution. One hand reached out to turn the crank on the passenger window; strands of hair that had fallen from her winter cap fluttered in the wind as she leaned her head out the window.

“We don’t have time for this, Mort,” she snapped. He bobbed his head in response and shuffled around toward the driver’s side. Tes dug his toe against the snow as he awaited her remarks, his lips contorted into a snarl. “We’re expecting company at the farm. Dad’ll have your skin if you aren’t there by sundown. Try not to mess _that_ up.”

Whatever response Tes may have had was lost over the roar of the ignition; Fina had a moment to jerk her head back into the vehicle before Mort had set the car into motion.

 

An arc of snow flung from the tires spattered Tes in the gritty, grimy stuff. He wiped the road salt away from his mouth before he turned back toward the cannery, jaw set as he trudged back to the building.

 

* * *

 

**_LUVERNE, MINNESOTA, JANUARY 3 rd, 1981._ **

 

* * *

 

 

Every two minutes, Cullen Rutherford dutifully extended the napkin that he had grasped in his hand to wipe lamely at the fogging of their windshield. Silence had fallen between the two of them, heads bowed over the matching Styrofoam cups wedged between their knees. Occasionally, one of them would take a pull from their cups of coffee, but neither of them endeavored to speak with one another. Conversation waxed and waned as their shift wore on—it was an inevitability that the two of them understood and did not struggle against.

It was Alistair who finally broke the silence, clearing his throat before he spoke. “The sergeant said something funny to me today,” he began. Cullen did not look up from his lap, though his hand shot out like clockwork to rub at the fogged-over glass.

“Huh?”

“He uh, he said that we brought the war home with us.”

Cullen’s brow creased in thought. “We brought the war home with us?” he echoed.

“That uh, we brought it back with us from Vietnam.”

“Huh.” Silence passed between them again. Alistair took another drink from his cup before shoving it back between his legs, absently wiping any straggling drops from his chin. “What do you figure he meant by that?”

“I reckon… well, I reckon he meant that things are gettin’ hairier around here. More violence, y’know, since uh came back from overseas. I guess he figures that changed us. Changed things over here, too. I don't know if I'd go that far, but...”

“Huh.”

Alistair rubbed at his neck beneath the collar of his bomber coat, scratching absently at the spots irritated by the fur-lined material. “Kinda makes you think, don’t it?”

“Reckon it does.”

Silence fell between the two of them again, fractured only by the squeak of Cullen’s soiled napkin against the windshield.

 

 


	2. Engastrimyth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fina Ghilain struggles to maintain her tenuous hold on the role of leader within her family's activities. Officer Theirin is called to a crime scene that doesn't quite add up.

**_FARGO, NORTH DAKOTA, JANUARY 3rd, 1981._ **

* * *

 

****

Every day between the hours of three and four o’clock in the afternoon, Fina sat with the corpse of her father in the ice house. A tacit though uneasy arrangement had been made with herself and the rest of the Clan—no one was to disturb her and no one was to bring it up in polite company.

 

Samir Ghilain’s body had taken up a semi-permanent residence in the shed behind their house. He had the poor taste to die early in December, an unfortunate lack of foresight on the former patriarch. He had barely made it past the age of sixty before a brain aneurysm took him in the middle of the night, leaving his children and wife with a corpse to deal with. At the time of his death, the ground had already been buried beneath snow and ice, leaving them no avenue to lay his remains to rest. They had tried once or twice to pierce the earth with a shovel, but that had only ended in frustration and sore hands.

 

The rest of the family viewed her daily residence in the ice house as ghastly, though nothing that Fina did was ever without purpose. Mort grimaced whenever the structure was mentioned. She could still use the threat of her father’s vengeance to keep Tes from throwing himself into short-sighted business arrangements, as though she could conjure his spirit and set him onto her younger brother. She did nothing to point out how ridiculous the thought was, nor did she do anything to counter whatever rumors passed between the grunts and underlings. Fear was an emotion that Fina could twist to her advantage easily and had, for the most part, kept any dissent over her grabs for power quiet.

 

“How do you figure these men from New Orleans will be here?” asked Bull. He was the only company that she ever took into the shack. He was as strong as a bull and twice as stubborn—or, so Samir had explained when he taken him in as a teenager. There was always something brewing beneath the surface with Bull. The man was always observing and cataloguing every minute detail that came cross his field of vision; his muscles always strained beneath his parkas, always ready to deal with some potential threat.

 

“Mort won’t want to hear any of it,” Fina began. She sat on a stool beneath a wall of fishing rods and glittering lures. Clutched in her lap was her cap, leaving her dark braid to hang over her shoulder. “Mom might. They offer money and she’ll go all doe-eyed around ‘em. She’s been itching to slow down and bake her bread, retire, but she can retire just the same if I’m running things.”

 

A grunt served as his response for the moment, but she knew the cogs in his head were turning. Bull had been the one steadfast companion she had come to rely on; her brothers both scrambled to fill the spot that their father’s death had left, pursuing any avenue to secure their birthright. Her birthright. Leadership went to the eldest, and had she not proven herself capable? She had negotiated and lied and killed to keep their shipping operations stable as they bickered among themselves, but they still gave her no more than derisive snorts whenever she reminded them of her right.

 

Fina had not minced words with her mother when she had learned that the Chalons family would be visiting. Not thinking clearly, of course, she had all but announced the fragile state that they found themselves in now. Sharks were circling in Cadillacs, eager to tear apart and divvy the territories among themselves. Short-sightedness had landed them in this position; had there been some plan in place in case of Samir’s death—but there hadn’t been and there wasn’t anything Fina could do except remain steadfast in her position of maintain the Ghilain Clan integrity.

 

“You shouldn’t trust your brother.”

 

Her laugh was unrestrained, teeth flashing and nostrils flaring. “Trust my brother, that’s good,” she choked out. “I trust him about as far as I can throw him.”

 

“So… not at all?”

 

“As I was saying,” she continued. “He cares about the family. Not me. But cares enough about our name. Our reputation.” Without a second thought, Fina would have quietly eliminated her siblings. Any threat to her power had to be dealt with swiftly, but they frothed at the mouth when anyone had a bad thing to say about the Ghilains. Respect was a piss-poor excuse for loyalty when it came to familial relationships-- she didn’t respect her brothers or their decision-making abilities. No one was better-suited or had been groomed for the emotional detachment that this particular dynasty required.

 

Any contradiction to her theories would have fallen on deaf ears, so silence passed between the two of them. She twisted her hat between her fingers, plucking at the loose fur and baring her teeth, brow twitching with her efforts. The snow crunched beneath his boots as he ducked his head to peer out from a crack in the siding, knees popping from his crouching. A rumbling noise had caught his attention-- the sputtering of a motor as it cut out in the cold and the low murmur of conversation. He could make out three figures plus the lone police officer in their two-car envoy, a familiar face that nervously bobbed and weaved among the self-assured men from New Orleans.

 

He expected her to leap from her seat, though she did not stop in the restless motions of her hands. Always wound so tight, ready to snap-- he had seen the wild swings of her tempers when things did not go in her favor, the simmering irritation that burst forth in obscenities and clenches fists. She seemed on the edge of combusting now, trembling and furious in the destruction of her winter hat. Chunks of fur had been pulled from the lining, collected in a neat pile by her feet.

 

“We gonna go?” Bull asked. She still did not look up, her lips forming around words that were never iterated. Finally, she pushed the ruined garment from her lap to stand, thrusting her right arm into the air so her sleeve slid past her wrist. She lifted her shoulders in a shrug before she lowered herself back onto her stool. She took care to stretch her legs in front of her, a lazy grin curling across her features as she regarded her companion.

"It's not four yet. I have a certain image to uphold here."

"You think they'll wait?"

She snorted derisively, assured that they would wait.

It was at 3:45 that Mort led Gaspard de Chalons and Raleigh Samson into the kitchen of their farmhouse. After all, every day between the hours of three and four o’clock in the afternoon, Fina sat with the corpse of her father in the ice house.

 

* * *

 

**_LUVERNE, MINNESOTA, JANUARY 3rd, 1981._ **

 

* * *

 

Sweet-smelling crime scenes had always thrown him for a loop. He knew that he should have maintained a certain amount of stoicism, frowning and serious as he catalogued evidence. Syrup permeated the air at the Waffle House, masking the stench of blood that came along with a quadruple homicide.

 

A local had contacted the police department frantically after his shift had ended. Cullen was unreachable without any indication of his destination-- which was his right after work, he insisted. It was Alistair who found himself bundled up again in the middle of the night, clutching a styrofoam cup of coffee and taking a statement from the resident who had found the waitress outside. The man had covered her with his coat, insisting that it didn’t seem right to just leave her out in the snow. She seemed cold, he had muttered.

 

Alistair tried to give the man’s jacket back, but he had refused before climbing back into his truck and taking off for the evening. He took the time to re-position it over the body of the woman. Droplets of blood dyed the snow across the parking long; she had, at the very least, tried to leave before she succumbed to her wounds. He was careful not to let his shoe smear the red snow any more than it already had been, lunging forward to clear the steps to the dining room. The bell tinkled overhead, giving him momentary pause; he squinted at the doorway before deciding that there was nothing of interest.

 

The diner was small, hardly larger than the size of a trailer. The three employees on duty had been killed; the waitress had been crumpled in the snow, the cook was strewn across the bar and the night manager had been executed in the booth he had been doing paperwork in. Green leather was stained with blood and skull fragments. It appeared to Alistair that the manager had been first, perhaps caught by surprise, though unlikely to the primary target. Waffle Hut had seven booths with which to sit customers and a small line of stools in front of a long stretch of counter-- perhaps twenty could comfortably be seated and eating on a busy day. Thieves were usually smarter about their targets, choosing businesses in the morning. It was before employees had a chance to run any money to the bank and before inventory for the day could be completed.

 

One body slumped in the booth closest to the doorway gave him pause; where the other three had been killed by gunshot wounds, a knife protruded from the corpse’s chest. “Someone must’ve really wanted you dead, eh, buddy?” he mumbled to ease his own nerves; he had lost his sensitivity to corpses from his time in Vietnam, but he could not prevent a sympathetic expression from crossing his fingers. “Sorry ‘bout that. Let’s see, uh, knife--” Multiple points of entry. Feathers had been forced from his coat with every thrust of the knife, seven distinct puncture marks across the subject’s broad chest.

 

“He wanted you, eh? The other three… just witnesses that had to be dealt with. Poor things.” He rifled through the jacket on the corpse, closing around packs of cigarettes and lighters that he stacked on the table. He grunted with the effort of shoving the corpse onto its side, plucking a wallet from the back pocket. “Let’s see who y’are. Call your family, figure this whole mess out for ya.”

 

He squirmed his way out of the booth bench, a bit too tight for his own stature. The wallet was a worn brown leather with a nothing but a debit card and some rewards card to a gas station up north-- Alistair poked through the pockets until he came upon a high school identification card. Dread settled into his chest until he noted the expiry date of 1977; young, but at least not some young student he had to report a death for.

 

Brows furrowed and lips parted, he squinted to pick out the faded lettering on the laminated paper. “Te… ah, can’t make out…” he grumbled to himself. He glanced around at the abysmal diner lighting, shoving the wallet he had collected into his pocket before he returned to his patrol car. It was there that he could hold his flashlight in his teeth and allow the dashboard to illuminate the name ‘GHILAIN’.

 

 


End file.
